


One Step Removed

by Pic_Akai



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-01
Updated: 2012-03-01
Packaged: 2017-10-31 23:41:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/349596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pic_Akai/pseuds/Pic_Akai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Sherlock dies and the rest of Greg's life falls around his ears, he turns to Mycroft.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Step Removed

**Author's Note:**

> This fic assumes knowledge of all of series one and two. It is finished as a standalone, but might turn into the first chapter of something longer; I'm not sure yet.

"I don't just do what your brother tells me," he'd said, to his pint, because it was a lie and they all knew it. Had it been true, he wouldn't have been at Grimpen in the first place, and especially not pretending - fruitlessly - to be there on an extremely coincidental holiday. To be fair, the pretence hadn't been Mycroft's suggestion, but it felt like something Greg ought to try, just to prove he really wasn't there because of Mycroft.

Except he had been, because Mycroft Holmes had only to click his fingers and Greg would jump, beg, whatever he was asked to do and probably more besides. It was disturbing, when he thought about it; both Holmes brothers had a hold over him in different ways. He took ludicrous risks for Sherlock all the time (he dressed it up like it was to solve crime, and it was, but it certainly wasn't only that) and he was clearly prepared to look like an idiotic puppet for Mycroft, which he supposed he was, really.

He had only spoken to Mycroft a handful of times over the years he'd known Sherlock. A few more times he'd received instructions via someone else, usually someone with a suit and no ID, but officious enough that they hadn't needed it to access the Met. Every time, it had been about Sherlock. Sometimes it was something simple, a brief intervention just to stop Sherlock from getting into a situation with the police which Mycroft would then have to sort out himself, or on a couple of occasions something more personal (as if purposefully aiding someone who was committing crime in not getting caught wasn't personal). Lestrade had seen Sherlock through a fairly nasty withdrawal, two nights when Mycroft couldn't get there because he was unavoidably detained on business in another country, and once turned up at a drug den just in time to back Sherlock up in a fight with seven other men (thankfully, mostly rather intoxicated).

But after Sherlock died, after Greg and half his team were suspended pending enquiries, after he and Lucy really had split up for good this time and the entirety of Greg's life seemed to be falling down around him, he, for once, turned to Mycroft.

He didn't get through immediately. The number he had put him through to a secretary, who transferred him to Mycroft's PA once she'd ascertained he was important enough, and then he was told Mycroft was busy at the moment but would call him back.

"Mm. Lucky bastard's still probably got work to do," he said, and hung up.

When Mycroft did phone, later, half past ten on a Wednesday night, he apologised for the late return of the call. He sounded normal, put together and smooth, and Greg hated him for it.

He didn't know what to say, and told him so. They sat in silence for a minute, Greg watching the dots blink seconds on the DVD player.

"Sherlock's dead," he said eventually, because that was the only reason why they were having this call. If Sherlock hadn't jumped off a building, he would never have felt the need to call Mycroft and sit in silence on the phone with him.

Mycroft didn't reply to that, which Greg thought at least maybe proved a bit that he cared. He should care, it was his bloody younger brother, and the only reason they even knew one another was because they'd both been trying to keep the recalcitrant arsehole safe. Evidently, they'd failed.

Greg needed to know that someone else cared, besides him. He knew John cared, but John cared entire universes away from the way in which Greg cared. John was almost literally broken, and Greg couldn't pretend to empathise with the way he felt. Besides which, John seemed to have forgiven him for going along with the doubt, feeding it instead of squashing it down like he should have done the minute Sally spoke to him, but he thought it was only because it was the easy thing to do. John didn't have the energy to be angry at Greg; he was too busy being angry with Sherlock and the world at large. Greg was still angry with himself, anyway, and seeing John wouldn't do either of them any good.

He'd spoken to Mrs Hudson, but she was a sturdy old lady. She'd had her share of grief in her time and although she treated Sherlock like a son sometimes, Greg suspected that was more out of longing for any child rather than one like Sherlock in particular. She'd tried to mother Greg, too, a bit, and he'd found it irritating rather than soothing. Clearly she was upset, but she hadn't orbited around Sherlock like the rest of them seemed to, unwillingly, even though she'd lived in the same building as him.

Molly didn't answer the couple of times he called her, and they hadn't really been more than casual acquaintances anyway. He didn't blame her if she wanted to pretend she'd never met Sherlock Holmes, and they wouldn't be running into one another at the mortuary any time soon. And nobody from the Yard seemed to give a crap; they'd all put up with Sherlock only at Greg's say-so, and he knew at least the few he'd spoken to were still blaming Sherlock for their being suspended, like it was his fault for being better at their jobs than they were.

So Mycroft it was, because there wasn't anybody else, and Greg's life was empty enough right now that filling it up with a fussy man from the government seemed like a good idea. He could go days on one phone call. Yesterday's lunch had taken him four hours.

"John said you told Moriarty about Sherlock," Greg said, after a long time. It wasn't that he wanted Mycroft to feel guilty - that was a given, anyway - it was just that he wanted to feel guilty along with someone else, too. If that was selfish, so be it. He'd been selfless enough for Sherlock's sake over the years, and for victims, and for his bosses, and for his wife, not that she'd agree.

"Yes," Mycroft said, tonelessly.

Greg thought for a bit. "I played into his game, too." It wasn't meant to assuage Mycroft's guilt; it was more an admission of his own.

"Moriarty was a very clever man," Mycroft said, almost like he was reading a story. "He was…Sherlock's equal, if not his better."

"No, he wasn't," Greg said vehemently. "Sherlock was fucking _miles_ better than him."

Mycroft sounded tired when he spoke this time, and finally it felt like Greg was talking to another human being. "I expect he would have been glad to hear you say that."

And then he realised, actually, that this was Sherlock's brother: the man who'd been trying to take care of him for decades before Greg came along, and from the sounds of it had received no thanks whatsoever. He'd dragged Sherlock back from the brink by the scruff of his neck on several occasions, but in the end even John, the miracle worker when it came to Sherlock, hadn't been able to stop him from killing himself, everyone who was left behind be damned.

"Can we meet up?" Greg asked, suddenly exhausted himself even though he'd done little but sleep and stare into space for the past several days. "Just for, I dunno, a drink or something, a meal, anything. Afternoon tea, if that's your thing."

Greg would swear he heard a hint of surprise in Mycroft's reply. "Would Friday evening work for you? It might be on the late side, I'm afraid."

"I've got bugger all going on," Greg said, meaning it in every sense of the phrase. "Friday night's fine for me. When and where?"

"If you could be ready for nine thirty, I can send a car for you when I'm finished," Mycroft said, and Greg agreed to this and then god, he needed to sleep again.

They ended the call and he practically crawled into bed, for the first time in over a week thinking about something other than Sherlock and how he'd ruined Greg's life.

If it had to be Sherlock's older brother, he'd take it. It was one step removed, at least.

**Author's Note:**

> I adore concrit.


End file.
